Power Pack #12: Underground

And, as Jeff so eloquently(?) sings, we are back in the sewers again! On the hunt for their lost backpacks, the team of pre-teens head into the dark…and meet a mess of mutants! That’s right, they are in the Morlock tunnels. Hopefully a couple of X-Men can get them out of this scrape. Along the way, we discuss depression and electricity….not at the same time.

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11 thoughts on “Power Pack #12: Underground”

There’s a bit of a weird coincidence with your opening advert. One of the many completed but unpublished Marvel comics of the 80s was Young Astronauts which was drawn by Power Pack’s June Brigman.

Probably worth mentioning that the costume Kitty wears in this issue is it’s only appearance. Somewhere around 2000 Marvel released an X-Men sketchbook of costume designs which features Art Adams’s designs for Kitty including thecostume from this issue, but by the time she wears it in X-Men it’s been altered to the blue version with the Madonna gloves that JRJR draws.

The only place I’ve seen Young Astronauts mentioned is in the Bullpen Bulletins bio of Assistant Editor Pat Redding. She lists it as the freelance work she’s most proud of (she was an inker) but there’s a reference to it probably never getting published. I’ve never seen it mentioned anywhere else.

I’m sure you guys already know this. There was some great tight continuity happening in these issues of Power Pack and X-Men. Prof X is saved by the Morlocks’ Healer in X-Men #193, and in those same pages, we learn of Annalee’s children being killed, one month before PP #12. And now this story continues into X-Men #195. That’s really great coordination for these books.

I could swear it’s stated much later that the Marauder Scalphunter (maybe during the Mutant Massacre issues) was the one that killed Annalee’s children. The rare situation where Claremont actually ties up a story thread!

Gee, I always thought Kitty’s costume was just a coloring mistake version of her Shadowcat outfit. I didn’t really think it was supposed to be a new costume. Hmmm. (Yes, I completely unironically used “Gee.”)

Completely agree about Leech. He is the sweetest character, and I love seeing him appear. Poor little pickle boy, meant with all affection.

I did not want to go too far down the X-Hole about Professor X and his adventures with the morlocks, but I believe you are correct about Scalphunter. I think it may even be in the Power Pack or X-Factor book. We will cover it when we get to the Mutant Massacer. It still amazes me that Power Pack was involved in that. I mean, it makes sense for logistics. The Simonsons worked pretty well with Cris Claremont, so it would have been easy to coordinate….but just the terror and death.

I was so used to Kitty having new or alternate costumes most of the time, I just did not even notice anymore.

Hello from your neighbor to the north in Seattle! Loving the podcast and looking forward to catching up to the current episodes. Thank you for enabling my Power Pack fanboy-ness – definitely enjoying going back and reading these for the first time in probably 15 years. An interview with June Brigman and an upcoming one with Louise Simonson – wow!! Something I never thought I’d experience, but I’m loving it. Next up – Glynis Wein?? Or Glynis Oliver?? Which is it?? Is she getting married and divorced every couple of months? Multiple personalities? Two different Glyni – a Wein/Oliver colorful dream team? I’m on the edge of my seat!!

Okay, for this issue, it’s always been one of my favorites, because Kitty and Kurt have also always been my 2 favorite X-characters, and I love that they’re the first ones that the Pack meets. I always wished that there would have been a panel of Julie meeting Lockheed. I’d have loved to see her reaction to him – especially since she’s lucky enough to have read The Harper Hall trilogy (coincidentally, I’m reading Anne McCaffrey’s books right now, because I could never make it through any besides the Harper Hall trilogy as a kid, learning about them from Julie, but now as an adult, I’m eating up her other Pern books – I just finished the Masterharper of Pern – so good).

Keep up the good work – it’s amusing to hear how you two crack each other up. Looking forward to catching up to the most recent episode!